WATTLE-CHEEKED HONEY-EATER. 
(scrubby) that begins about thirty miles north-east of Albany and extends 
to the Staling Ranges. 
“ This species inhabits open light timbered country, as scrubby sand- 
plain and ‘ Marloclc ’ scrub. They are fairly plentiful in such country twenty 
to thirty miles east, and south-east of Broome Hill. They are very restless, 
noisy and pugnacious. August 20/08. Many seen and a pair shot 35 miles 
S.E. of Broome Hill. Sept. 12/08. Nest containing two incubated eggs, 
built five feet above ground, east of Broome Hill. Oct. 10/08. Two males 
and one female obtained at above locality, male evidently breeding. Oct. 2/10. 
Nest with two fresh eggs built 3 feet 6 inches off ground in a dwarf fir tree. 
Many fledged young seen about same date, also on March 15/10.” 
Writing about the birds of the Stirling Ranges, South-west Australia, 
Whitlock has stated : “ Mr. Milligan describes this bird * as local in a 
pronounced degree.’ I, on the other hand, found it not uncommon. This 
may have been due either to concentration brought about by the recent bush 
fires or to my having made a closer examination of the country than was 
possible in his case. Wherever any extensive patches of marlock or mallee had 
escaped the general destruction, there I found this beautiful Honey-eater. 
It is hardly a bird likely to escape observation. If it may not be described 
as inquisitive, like Ptilotis sonora, it is equally determined to make its presence 
known. In its general habits it reminded me of Ptilotis leucotis, or rather 
P. novcenorcice, as our interior form is called. It was equally noisy and active, 
and its notes are heard here, there, and everywhere, when an intruder invades 
its haunts. Sometimes a single bird, or even a pair, would approach closely 
and peer through the intervening branches at the stranger, but more often 
they flew from point to point in a circular course, continually calling to one 
another with their unmusical notes. I found eight or nine nests in all, but their 
discovery was by no means an easy task. The first I obtained in a very small 
dwarf Banksia. The nest was suspended from the foliage of the bush in a little 
recess, and I considered myself lucky not to pass it by unobserved. It 
contained two fresh eggs. All the other nests I found—some with eggs, others 
with newly hatched young — were very low down ; none higher than three feet. 
All were very neatly made of green grasses, held together by spiders webs 
and lined with the same soft material. I remarked the situation of one I 
found building by fixing a piece of cotton-wool to a dry twig. This was 
promptly seized by the female and used as lining for her nest. The eggs 
have been accurately described in Mr. A. J. Campbell’s work (see p. 401), 
but both eggs and nest appear to be remarkably small for the size of the 
parent bird. Generally, I think, however, the female is the smaller of the two 
sexes in this species. (This is usually the case in the genus Ptilotis. Eds.). 
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